Daily Republican., 1887-08-02
FARM TALK,

htco.u.
know that the reade: of the Vii
lage Record are fond of conundrums,
80 here Is one for them:
If farmer sells his wheat to the
miller for eighty cents per bushel, the
miller grinds it into -four and sells i,
to the baker for one dollar and twenty
cents, the baker adds a little water
yeast and alum to 1t and sells it back
to the faimer lor two dollars and forty
cents. (six cents per loaf, how long
will it be before the said farmer will
have to make an assignment for the
benefit of his creditors?
The person who can answer that can
probably tell us how many pounds
there are in coal dealers ton.
This is not an exaggeration, as |
know farmers who are doing it. am
am not one OF them.
Some farmers will sell their pork In
he winter for five or six dollars a
hundred weight. The next summer
they will pay the store-keeper fifteen
cents per pound for hams.
Others will run to COW sales and pay
high prices for cows. In two or three
years they will sell the same cows to
the butcher to make into bologna sau.
sage. The butcher will pay them
probably eight or ten dollars apiece for
them. 1t the farmer wants Q piece of
steak the butcher will only charge him
sixteen cents pound for it, or ten
cents for q cut just back of the horns.
Those farmers are always talking
about hard times and saying that farm
ing does not pay.
Now is q good time to 60 through
the corn rows and pull out the suckers
or the rag weeds that may have start,
ed up since the last working. They
will shorten the crop very much if
they are allowed to remain Two
stalks Of corn are all that should be al
lowed to remain in the hill, no matter
how strong the soil is One stalk in a
place would be better. twenty-one
inches apart in the row, with rows
three feet nine wide. You will have
nore ears with three or four stalks in
the hill, but two stalks in the hill will
yield the most shelled corn, as l have
found by careful experiments. A few
years ago in thinning out my corn l
left forty-eight hills (enough for one
shock) with three stalks in the hill
The remainder of the field was thinned
to two stalks in the hill. At husking
time the corn and the fodder was care
fully weighed. found that the forty
eight hills yielded ten pounds of corn
and four pounds of fodder less than
the adjacent forty-eight hills that had
the smaller number of stalks. | think
the same theory would hold good in
seeding wheat. l have tried one
bushel OF seed wheat per acre and had
as much wheat per acre as my neigh
bors had who sowed two bushels Of
seed. Some of these days / am going
to try one half a bushel of seed. ]
think it is great plenty If we can get
the ground in the right order and can
get every grain to sprout.
| Corn to make green feed for the
cows should not be planted too thick
about three grains to the foot with the
rows three feet apart will be abou
fright. 1t should not be fed to tho
cows until small ears have formed OF
the stalks. Iffed when too young ant
green it will do the cows very littlt
good; they may give a great quantity
of milk, but there will be very littl,
cream on it.
Ploughing is very hard work for thu
horses, and it can be made more so by
the ignorance of the ploughman. TIL,
pateEt chilled ploughs now in use art
said to run easy, but they will run very
hard if they are improperly adjusted
for instance the wheel and cleyis on
the end of the beam, the clevis is Sc
too high and the wheel too low there
by pressing too hard on the ground, o.
the plough is set TO take too much land
and in order to make it take less thu
driver holds one handle higher thai
the other. These little things are inn
portant to know, as the draught can b.
increased fifty pounds very easily
which amounts to a great deal in th'
course of days ploughing.
have seen man ploughing all da,
with the hip straps on one horse toe
short. The poor horse was exhaust
ing his strength pulling down on hi
own hips Instead of straight from tn
names to the double tree. In order tc
run easy and do the work in a proper
manner, the plough should be SCI
square down in the furrow; set t
cover no more land than the share vii
cut, the wheel should touch the groun
very lightly, the chains not too long
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